


It's A Wonderful Love

by LadyGlinda



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angels, Christmas Eve, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fantasy, Fluff and Angst, Guilt, Inspired By The Movie "It's A Wonderful Life" And The Television Series "Highway To Heaven", M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Mycroft Feels, Post-Episode: s04e03 The Final Problem, Sherlock Being a Good Brother, Sibling Incest, Suicidal Thoughts, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, holmescest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:13:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21779632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyGlinda/pseuds/LadyGlinda
Summary: After Sherrinford, Mycroft feels horrible. He decides to end his life on Christmas Eve, thinking the world would be better off without him. But someone comes and shows him how important he is.
Relationships: Mycroft Holmes/Sherlock Holmes
Comments: 39
Kudos: 122





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Loosely based on the sources mentioned in the tags. The angel looks like Michael Landon, star of "Highway to Heaven", which I loved and watched several times. No knowledge of these sources is necessary for this fic. Not sure if there will be smut in the second chapter, which I still have to write.

It was a chilly evening. Mycroft Holmes, dressed in an impeccable three-piece-suit and a long, woollen coat, looked up at the sky. When had he last seen the stars? It had been cloudy and rainy all day, actually all month, but now it had cleared up. Would this be the last thing he would see? The stars in the sky?

The old Mycroft Holmes – arrogant, superior and convinced that he was the smart one compared to basically everyone – would have rolled his eyes at this banality. Well, nothing was left of him besides the clothes. And very soon nothing would be left of the new one, the pathetic one, either.

He made a step forward. On this part of the Thames shore, there were no lights. Nobody was walking his dog here tonight. Of course not. It was Christmas Eve. People were sitting in their bright living rooms now, sharing dinner and wine with their loved ones. Laughing, joking.

Sherlock would spend the holidays with his family of course – Doctor Watson and his child. The ex-soldier had moved back into Baker Street when it had been rebuilt after the explosion. He would look after his brother like he had done in their early days, before Mary Morstan had shown up in his life and things had started to get sour between them, cumulating in the violence he had unleashed at Sherlock after her death.

But of course Sherlock had forgiven him. And now they would raise the doctor's child together. Perhaps Sherlock would even visit Eurus during the holidays. Would play the violin with her. It seemed to make him happy, and of course Eurus enjoyed his attention. She had played her deadly games to get it after all. In the end, she had won.

The water looked black and ugly. How cold would it be? How long would it take to drown? Well, he would see. Another step.

“It's a lovely Christmas night, isn't?”

Mycroft almost fell forward into the water at this dark but cheerful voice from behind. He turned and saw a stranger. A man, about his age, with thick greying curls that fell onto his broad shoulders. He was dressed in black from head to toe and his teeth were very white when he smiled at Mycroft now.

“Would you like a chewing gum?” The man offered him a package and his dark eyes were sparkling.

Mycroft grimaced. What he wanted was to be left alone so he could get it over with. “No, thank you. If you excuse me now…”

“Oh, I will not, you know.”

“Sorry?” Mycroft stared at him. “What do you want?”

“Ah, this question. So hard to answer.” The tall man gestured at a bench about twenty metres away. Mycroft hadn't even noticed it before. “Come, let's sit down for a moment.”

“It's icy cold.” Mycroft shook his head over himself. Did that really matter? The water would certainly feel colder… But he didn’t want to sit down with this guy. Why should he?

“Humour me, Mr Holmes.”

Mycroft froze. “Do I know you?”

“No. But I know _you_. Everything about you from the moment you were born. Your parents were so proud.” The man showed his perfect teeth again.

Mycroft snorted. “Well, that has changed quite a bit,” he retorted. In fact his parents didn’t talk to him anymore. Mummy had taken his hand the one time he had accompanied them and Sherlock to Sherrinford to listen to his younger siblings play the violin together. But when Eurus had never spoken again and ignored the parents, solely focusing on Sherlock (with whom she didn’t talk either though), they had been suffering tremendously, and they had let him feel it. No phone calls anymore. No plea to visit them with Sherlock. He was already dead for his parents.

“Ah, they still are. They just have a hard time accepting what happened to her daughter.”

What was going on here? This stranger knew about Eurus?! Nobody did! The press had never been informed about the events of Sherrinford. The guards had been replaced and the compromised ones had been forced to keep silent. The deaths of the Garridebs and the governor and his wife had been explained to the ones who cared in completely different ways. “Who are you? The devil?” God, where had this come from now?!

The man chuckled. “Ah, how dramatic. And wrong. I'm an angel. The other side, you know?” He pointed up at the sky. “Don't get fooled by me wearing black. Makes me look slimmer, you know? You can call me Joseph by the way.”

Mycroft shook his head. “Go now, whoever you are. I am busy.”

“Oh yes. Busy killing yourself.”

“Well, that was an easy guess.”

Joseph smirked. “An easy deduction, you mean?”

Mycroft stared at him for a long moment. “God doesn't exist. So angels don't exist either.”

“Ah, but you asked if I was the devil! If you believe in one of them, you have to believe in the other, too.”

Mycroft had never even wondered if there was something like the devil. In fact he thought mankind was evil enough to make the existence of such a figure redundant… One just had to watch the news to come to this conclusion. Still he had asked this stupid question. To get an even stupider answer… “I don't care.”

“But, you know, He cares.” The finger was pointed at the star-filled sky again.

Mycroft shook his head. “Why should he, even if he does exist. I am… a loser.” He winced when his arm was grabbed but he let himself be guided to the bench. In fact his legs seemed to walk by themselves, as cold as they were. When he sat down, he felt a warm pillow beneath his bottom. “How…”

“Ah, my little secret,” Joseph smirked. “And you are not a loser, Mycroft Holmes. Your brother even calls you the British Government.”

“He was just joking. And how can you… Never mind. Fact is, the world will be better off without me. ” He thought of the past months, even years. “It would be better if I had never been born.” The governor would still be alive. Eurus wouldn't have shot his wife, either. She had affected Sherlock's life so badly. Everything was his fault. If he hadn't let Moriarty visit her…

“You are wrong,” Joseph said softly. “A world without you would be a very different place but it would not be better.”

“Well, I do think so.”

“Then, my dear boy, let me show you something.”

Mycroft gasped when a huge bubble, there was no other word for it, appeared in the air, floating in front of them. He saw the streets of London, a bit blurry as if he was watching them through a filter, or, well, a soap bubble. There were people, many of them obviously homeless. Everybody looked pained and scared and hopeless. Even the trees looked depressed.

“Without your work for the government, the Prime Ministers did huge damage to the economy,” Joseph explained. “Millions of people are unemployed and lost their homes.”

“Well, they voted for them,” Mycroft mumbled.

Joseph looked at him for a long moment before he continued. “If you hadn't been born, your sister would have just been rotting in her prison cell.” The bubble showed the glass cell of Sherrinford. Eurus was sitting on her bed, her head shaved, her face showing pure horror. “She wouldn’t have got any work to do. Look at this version of her. It killed her soul completely.”

“You seriously want me to _pity_ her? She's a monster!” He had been way too kind to her.

Joseph nodded. “Unfortunately, this is true. But…” He showed him a burning building. “She wasn't asked to identify threats so the country was plagued by terrorist attacks over the last decades. Terrorists blew up Heathrow. And Buckingham Palace…”

Mycroft winced when he saw the ruins of the Queen's home. “I don't care,” he said, stubbornly. “Someone else could have done this job.”

“Really? Well. What about your family? Your brother?”

Mycroft shook his head. “He would have been happier without me. All my meddling in his life led to nothing but pain for him.” He thought of Sherlock's mission to take down Moriarty's network. It had been his idea. Sherlock had lost two years of his life and come back with a body full of scars, and the man he had obviously secretly loved had fallen for a woman who then had shot at Sherlock. He had murdered to save her life nonetheless, which had almost destroyed his future. Without him, Mycroft, John would have never met Mary. And without Eurus talking to Moriarty, she wouldn’t have been so obsessed with trying to bond with Sherlock. He had barely escaped from Sherrinford alive. In short, he had done a rubbish job as a big brother to say the least…

Sherlock had texted him a few times over the past weeks but Mycroft had never got back to him. What was there to say? He had been thankful that Sherlock had tried to protect him from their parents' wrath but he'd had that coming after all. He'd had it all coming. He proceeded to get up to return to the river but his legs wouldn’t move.

Before he could protest, Joseph nodded and said, “Well, let's see about Sherlock, hm?”

Mycroft groaned when he looked at a figure, lying on the floor in a dirty room. He could see black curls, sticky with blood, a pale face with the blue-green eyes open and lifeless. “No…”

“His drug problem was way worse without a brother to show him how to build a mind palace and to generally care about him,” the angel explained. “A dealer killed him when he was not able to pay for the stuff as he needed more and more of it. He was twenty-two.”

Mycroft could feel tears running down his cheeks. When had he cried the last time?

“Of course it might be unimportant to you, but John Watson therefore never met your brother, obviously. He killed himself as he couldn’t get over his depression after returning from Afghanistan.”

Mycroft looked at the dead Doctor Watson, lying on a bed, the gun on the floor next to it. “No loss,” he croaked. Was this real? Was he already drowning and hallucinating? Or was this an unbearable afterlife he had never believed in?

“Maybe not. He is not a very nice man. But his daughter, Rosamund… She will become a doctor, too, and eventually she will find a cure for two diseases that nowadays kill a lot of people. But without you, she'd have never been born of course.”

Mycroft was shivering from head to toe. Everything the angel had told or shown him was horrible. But the worst was the thought that Sherlock would be dead without him.

“Your life is a gift, Mycroft Holmes,” the angel whispered, his voice full of compassion and understanding. “Sometimes it's hard and things happen that make us feel horrible. But you are not responsible for what your sister did. That Jim Moriarty targeted your brother had nothing to do with you. In fact, if he hadn't met your sister, he would have killed Sherlock.”

Mycroft swallowed. “Is that true?”

Joseph smiled. “I'm an angel. I can't lie. Everything I told you and showed you was true. You will go home now. There's a surprise waiting for you.”

Mycroft closed his eyes. “You said you know everything about me…”

“Oh yes. I know _that_ , too.” Joseph gave him a knowing look.

“And still you came to save me?”

Joseph put his hand onto his shoulder. “God loves love. He doesn’t judge love.”

“But Sherlock would…” His darkest secret. Hidden deep in his heart.

“Follow your heart tonight, Mycroft. It knows best. You won't see me again. But don't forget what you saw tonight.”

And the next moment, Mycroft was standing in front of his house. He almost fell over when he lost his balance. How had he got here? His heart was hammering.

And then the door was opened up.

“Oh, there you are. I hope you don't mind that I, well, broke in. Again. I came alone. No clown tonight.”

Mycroft stared at Sherlock, who was smiling rather shyly at him. He was wearing a slim black suit and his purple shirt and his cheeks were rosy. In his mind's eye, he saw him lying on this dirty floor again. “No. No, of course I don't mind. I'm glad you're here.” And with this, he entered his house on shivering legs.


	2. Chapter 2

“I don’t know what to say. Thank you, obviously.” Sherlock had brought sandwiches. Even some from his favourite shop. Thick, tasty calorie bombs. Tuna, bacon, egg salad – everything Mycroft loved to eat.

“I thought it’s Christmas. Not the time to make the diet you don’t need anyway.” Sherlock gave him a brief smile and looked around. “Nothing looks like it’s Christmas.” Of course it didn’t. Mycroft decorating a Christmas tree? For whom? Sherlock caught his look. “I remembered, you know. You loved Christmas as a boy.”

So he was regaining more of his childhood memories. Ironically, Mycroft had forgotten about that one. But of course he recalled it now – how lovely Mummy’s trees had looked. The living room had been full of lights and cute little… angels…

Had this really happened? Had an angel, an actual angel, shown him how the world would have been without him? And then beamed him home to find the ‘surprise’ he had promised – in form of his little brother, who had even brought dinner?

Yes, Mycroft decided. He had experienced it with his own eyes so it had indeed happened. “Would you like some brandy?” he asked Sherlock, who had sat down on the couch.

“Just a bit.”

“Sure.” Of course he didn’t want to be tipsy when he came home to his doctor and the little girl.

Sherlock gave him a long look. “John is visiting his parents. His sister will be there, too.”

“Oh, I see. You didn’t want to accompany him?”

Sherlock shook his head. “Why would I? It’s his family, not mine. _You_ are my family.”

“That sounded a bit different last time,” slipped out of Mycroft's mouth when he handed Sherlock the half-full glass.

“It was stupid. John is my friend. You’re my brother. Damn, Mycroft, why did you ignore me all the time?” Sherlock suddenly burst out. “Because I said this? Because I let you believe I would shoot you? I had to, you know. I planned to point the bloody gun at my head right away but I had to wait for the moment that would shock her the most.”

“It was all my fault, Sherlock. Without me, nothing of this would have happened.” And then Mycroft shot his mouth, recalling what Joseph had said: without Moriarty meeting Eurus, he would have killed Sherlock. Did he believe that? A part of him did. The other part was still feeling so guilty…

“I urged you to bring us to Sherrinford, Mycroft. And if Eurus and Moriarty were so smart to cause so much trouble within five minutes, they deserved their game time.”

“But the governor’s wife didn’t deserve to die,” Mycroft whispered. “And the innocent Garridebs...”

“Mycroft. Listen to me. It was not your fault.” Sherlock was leaning forward now, his look fierce. “If the governor had left her alone, Eurus wouldn’t have been able to play these games. It was his fault, not yours. And neither of the Garridebs was innocent. I talked to Lestrade about them afterwards. They were all criminals and they were only not in prison because the police couldn’t find enough evidence against them. You can blame their deaths on them then. Eurus shot the wife, not you. You were too decent to shoot anyone. I don’t blame you and I never did. And Mycroft, I’m bloody sorry I sent Lestrade to you instead of checking on you myself. That was a really bad move.”

Sherlock was feeling guilty? Because of him? Now that was something new. And he couldn’t have it. “You are not responsible for me. I’m your older brother and I will always...”

“...be there for me, I know. But I wanted to be there for you, too, for weeks, and you didn’t let me. I should have come here long before.”

“Well, you are busy. Your work, your doctor, your...”

“My what?” Sherlock huffed. “Are you seriously implying I’m in a relationship with John? That’s just ridiculous.”

“Is it? I saw all those looks between you two. If you hadn’t gone away to chase Moriarty’s people, he would have never married this awful woman.”

“I kind of liked her, you know...”

“Yes, that’s why you let her shoot you and still killed for her...”

Sherlock bit his lip. “It is futile to talk about this, Mycroft. She had her reasons, I had mine, and now she’s dead and yes, it was my fault.”

“No it was not!”

“Well, I do think so. Just like you think you are responsible for the horrible day in Sherrinford.”

“That is not the same. I was there – she jumped in front of the bullet.”

Sherlock nodded. “Yes. It was her choice. But without me talking so much, this bullet… Anyway. It doesn’t really matter anymore, Mycroft. It’s done. Nothing we could do would change it anymore.”

Mycroft could hear the pain in his – undeniably reasonable – words. “Yes,” he said softly. “But it is not so easy to get over such things.”

“What is ever easy?” Sherlock asked. “I can tell you what is not – looking into Rosie’s eyes and knowing that one day I’ll have to explain to her why she is growing up without a mother.”

His brother had really taken to this child. And still he wasn’t interested in a relationship with John?

Sherlock sighed. “Even if John was gay, I wouldn’t want anything from him. I want his friendship, his support, his help for my work. He is very important to me. But he will never be my… lover.”

He seemed to have difficulties to even speak out this word. Mycroft was glad to hear it anyway. Not just because… Not a good moment to think about this. But if Sherlock had to find a partner, it would hopefully not be someone who physically abused him… Mycroft tried not to show his relief too clearly. “So you are friends, like before.”

“Before… We will never be like before. The man who came back from Serbia wasn’t the man who fell off St. Bart’s,” Sherlock said slowly. “And John is not the same anymore, either. But we found a new basis. And he promised to never lash out at me again.”

“He better not!” Mycroft snarled. “Sorry,” he said then. “You are an adult. You can be friends with whomever you like to. I won’t mess with your life anymore. That was one of the reasons for me to… step back.”

“ _Step back_? You made yourself invisible! And I clearly did not demand that.” Sherlock sounded actually hurt.

“No, you didn’t. I’m sorry. I hope we can… find a new basis as well.”

Sherlock gave him a strange look. “I hope that, too. That’s why I’m here. And now let’s eat something.”

And they did, and the sandwiches were delicious, and the atmosphere was calm and actually friendly. But somehow also a bit… weird. Loaded with indescribable tension. But at least Sherlock wasn’t mad at him. He didn’t blame him. And he seemed to want to stay for a while, and nothing could have made Mycroft happier.

At least that was what he was thinking at this point...

*****

When Sherlock had finished eating, and to Mycroft's delight, he had eaten a lot, he took his phone. Mycroft tried not to be disappointed. Of course his brother would check his texts and if he was missing something more interesting than hanging around with his pathetic brother.

But Sherlock, without looking up, said calmly, “I can hear you thinking, Mycroft, and you are wrong.” And then the first tunes of ‘Silent Night’ filled the room and he put his phone onto the table. “I thought some Christmas vibes won't go amiss.” He glanced at Mycroft and actually smiled at him, and Mycroft could feel his chest get warm.

“No. They really don't,” he agreed. He had always liked this song. Not that he would have admitted it. To whom, anyway? He didn’t have any friends. There was nobody he would ‘chat’ about personal matters with. He didn’t have friends but he did have a brother. So he said, “I've always liked this song.”

Sherlock smiled and there was a knowing look in his eyes. “I knew you're an old romantic at heart,” he teased, not mocked him. There was no malice in his tone.

“Well, you saw my film collection,” Mycroft remarked. “Black and white. Rather silly stuff. Meant for escapism.”

Sherlock sipped at his drink. “I'm sorry, Mycroft. I should have never done this. Break in, ruin the family film. Touch your personal things. Scare you.”

Mycroft gave him a sad smile. “John said it had been his idea. You could have asked me, you know, about Eurus. I probably wouldn’t have told you but you could have asked.”

Sherlock gaped at him for a moment before his deep laughter echoed through the room. “God, you, making jokes. It _is_ Christmas!” He gave him a cautious look as if he wondered if he had overstepped the mark.

But Mycroft just smiled. “I'm doing my best.”

Sherlock grew serious at once. “Yes. You've always done.”

“And I'm very limited…”

Sherlock shook his head, grimacing. “They didn’t mean that. They were shocked and upset and lashed out because they didn’t understand it. They will recover and then everything will be like before: they will want us to visit them and we will say we are too busy. They will come to London and neither of us will want to spend time with them.”

It was cruel but true. He had been upset about their parents’ behaviour towards him even though he had understood it but in fact their relationship had never been exactly great. He respected them and enjoyed Mummy's cooking and care to some extent, and Father was usually a very gentle man. But he didn’t feel any deep affection for them. Or for anyone. Anyone but the beautiful man sitting opposite of him.

So much had been standing between them during the past decades. The Eurus-secret. Sherlock's drug use. The age gap. The estrangement, resulting in him going to uni at a very early age, leaving his so much younger but so bright brother behind with nobody to talk to. And that he was feeling for Sherlock like a brother shouldn’t do didn’t make it any easier. He would have to suppress this with all he had if they really managed to get a better relationship. If they met and spent time together like they were doing now. He wanted this. Very much. But he couldn’t risk Sherlock finding out about his feelings.

And all of a sudden, he heard Joseph's voice: _‘Follow your heart tonight. It knows best.’_ What had the angel – and yes, Mycroft, rational, calculating Mycroft, had accepted that he had really spoken to an angel – meant by this? Sherlock was here in a brotherly capacity, and this was already a miracle. He was alone this Christmas and he had reached out to him and he obviously seriously wanted to improve their relationship. That was great and Mycroft would do anything he could to make it work. But somehow he didn’t really think Joseph had meant this…

“Will you visit Eurus this Christmas? I can have it organised,” he tested the waters.

Sherlock shook his head. “No. I might go there again in January. If you don't mind.”

“Why would I?” Because she had wanted Sherlock to kill him? In the end, she had let him get away. And she could have finished him off easily when Sherlock had been gone and he had been at her mercy all by himself…

“I should have asked you if you can live with it,” Sherlock said, seriously. “I should have done a lot of things when it came to you.”

“Oh, just forget it, Sherlock. You don't owe me anything.”

“Mycroft,” Sherlock said, his voice almost dangerously low, “I basically owe you _everything_.”

Mycroft was speechless for a moment. He felt goose bumps breaking out on his arms when he recalled the image Joseph had shown him – the image of a dead Sherlock. “No, you don't,” he mumbled, shivering. He couldn’t tell Sherlock about this. His brother would have him institutionalised within the blink of an eye…

Sherlock didn’t miss his discomfort but not even he could deduce this truth. “Have you caught a cold? Where have you been anyway? You looked frozen when you came in.” He got up and took the blanket from the other end of the couch, draping it around Mycroft's shoulders.

This gesture was so sweet and caring that Mycroft lost his composure. When had Sherlock ever been so gentle to him? Well, never, obviously. To his great horror, he could feel his eyes getting wet. And of course Sherlock saw it.

“Myc. What is wrong?” His arm was wrapped around his shoulder now, and Mycroft could feel the warmth through the blanket and his clothes.

“Nothing. I'm sorry.”

“Brother, don't be sorry for everything. There is absolutely nothing to be sorry for. It's okay to feel… I don't know _how_ you feel…”

“Thank God,” slipped out of Mycroft's mouth before he could think about it. He could feel his cheeks flush.

Sherlock looked at him, his expression unreadable. Then he shook his head. “I do know _this_.”

“What?” It couldn’t be. He had been so careful. Well, not right now, but Sherlock had clearly not got this only in this moment.

Sherlock nodded. “I saw it in Sherrinford, when you seriously thought I'd shoot you. Which was not very smart…”

“You were the smart one there, without a doubt.” He was babbling but this was the situation he had always feared but not expected to ever actually happen. Sherlock knew? He had seen it? Deduced it? And still he was here?!

“At first I didn’t know what I had seen,” Sherlock continued, his voice very quiet. “But in retrospect… So much made sense. That you never let me down… Kidnapping John on the first day… Watching over me… Even your displeasure about Irene fooling me, and please don't think anything ever happened between us. And you wouldn’t have let me die in Eastern Europe if the Moriarty-video hadn't shown up, would you?”

“Of course not!” Mycroft was appalled. “I would have got you out!” Great… He had thought Sherlock would shoot him and Sherlock had thought he had really sent him on a death mission without a rescue plan… The smart brothers Holmes…

“I know this now. And I thought a lot about what I believed I had seen. Perhaps that was why I wasn't more insistent when it came to meeting.”

It felt like a cold shower. But what had he expected? Of course Sherlock felt repulsed by his unwelcome feelings even if he didn’t show his disgust. “I'm sorry…”

“Didn’t I tell you that you don't have to be?” Sherlock admonished him – and then he kissed him on the lips.

For a moment that simultaneously felt like ages and seconds, Mycroft gave into this completely unexpected contact. He indulged in the sweetness and softness of Sherlock's mouth, let himself be explored and tasted by a man who had clearly never kissed anyone before but was learning incredibly fast. Then he pulled back, realising, in wonder, how dazed Sherlock's eyes looked. “Sherlock… What is this about? You just said it made you…”

“What I meant is that I wasn't ready for it right away,” Sherlock interrupted him. “But do you really think I would have kissed you if I wasn't ready now?”

“But… why? How?”

Sherlock gave him a soft smile. “Because I realised I'm in love with you. I don't know when it happened but I guess these… sentiments grew since we started to plan my mission. I found out that we are a good team. That you are not only very smart but also very… great… I can't explain it. But I know my own mind. My heart, too, if you want. And we will have to talk about a lot of things but now, if you don't mind, I would like to get some more kisses.”

Sherlock asking him for kisses. There was only one answer to this.

Mycroft robbed a bit away from him, making him frown, before he pulled him with him so he was lying with his head on the armrest of the couch, getting the blanket around both their bodies, Sherlock ending up straddling him – and then they kissed. Stopped to look at one another, deducing each other to shreds. And kissed some more. And because it felt so incredible and wonderful and like everything he had ever wished for and Sherlock seemed to like it just as much, they kissed even more.

When Sherlock broke the kiss eventually, both of them out of breath, Mycroft knew by looking at his face that kissing would not be the only activity they would indulge in in this magic Christmas night. And since his brain said, _‘No, you can't do it, even if he wants it, it's much too early’_ but his heart said, _‘It’s what you both want and neither of you is going to regret it tomorrow, and you belong together’_ he chose the heart because an angel had told him to do so.

So when Sherlock's hand opened the buttons of his shirt, he let him, and he stared at Sherlock in wonder when he glanced at him with a look full of reverence. Mycroft had never found his ageing, hairy body overly attractive, but he knew he was in nice shape for a man who was both middle-aged and sitting behind a desk all day. But that Sherlock so obviously liked what he saw made his heart swell with love and gratitude.

He let Sherlock rub his hand over his hairy chest and tease his nipples, and he felt his pants go tight. A part of him still almost expected to be struck by lightning for being so intimate with his own baby brother but the rest was just happy to make him his lover.

And then Sherlock laid his hand flat on his chest, directly over his heart, and he gave him a look full of sympathy and deep affection. “I can feel your heartbeat,” he said, and something in his tone made Mycroft understand that Sherlock knew what he had almost done tonight. That there almost wouldn’t have been any heartbeat left in him anymore.

And how could he have even planned to do this? He hadn't thought about how Sherlock would be feeling about it. But of course – he had been convinced Sherlock wouldn’t miss him…

“Promise me, Mycroft, that if you ever feel like this again, you’ll take the phone and call me.” Sherlock's voice was heavy with sentiment and worry.

Mycroft nodded. “I promise.” He was sure he would never be in such a situation again. Even if this failed, if Sherlock decided he didn’t want to continue being with him like this, he wouldn’t do that. He would have his memories and he hoped Sherlock would never hate him for what they would do. They would always be brothers and Mycroft wouldn’t give him a hard time if he broke off what else they were about to become.

“Don't worry, brother mine,” Sherlock said, his eyes glued to Mycroft's. “I am not going to change my mind.”

Mycroft was aware people changed their minds all the time and especially when it came to lovers. And Sherlock was completely inexperienced, and once he wasn't anymore, he might come to the conclusion he could as well have someone he didn’t have to hide from the world…

“Stop thinking,” Sherlock said. “I know I can't convince you now. But I will bloody try…” And with this he lowered his head and closed his lips around Mycroft's left nipple and Mycroft slumped into the cushions with a groan.

His arms were firmly closed around Sherlock's lithe form, and with closed eyes, he enjoyed being worshipped. Whenever he had allowed himself to fantasise being with his baby brother like this at all, it had been him who explored Sherlock's body with his lips and hands. And he would do that very soon if Sherlock wanted him to. But right now it felt just right to receive his caresses and he didn’t even protest when Sherlock's lips closed around the wide head of his prick and carefully sucked it. His hands were stroking Sherlock's face and hair while he gave him head, and it felt like all the hurt and the feeling of failure were leaving his body when his arousal grew stronger and stronger, and when he released himself into Sherlock's now firmly sucking mouth (after giving him a stammered warning that Sherlock ignored), it felt as if he was delivered from all the pain and the guilt that had been weighing on his soul for months.

Sherlock joined him, snuggling his head against his neck, his own erection poking against Mycroft's groin through his trousers, and Mycroft would take care of him as soon as he had his breath back. But he allowed himself a brief moment of sheer bliss, caused by his strong orgasm and the feeling of Sherlock's heart beating against his chest.

And when he closed his arms tight around the man he loved once more, he mumbled, “Thank you, Joseph.” In his mind's eye, he could see the angel smiling with his perfectly white teeth.

Sherlock lifted his head. “Who's Joseph?”

Mycroft smiled. “That's a long story and you won't believe it.”

“Oh, try me.”

“Later, little brother. Don't you think you're wearing too many clothes?”

“I do!” And Sherlock was up in a second and undressing, and Mycroft was watching him with a smile.

He could see the scars his brother's reckless life and bad company had left, and he made a vow to himself, once again, to never let anything happen to his beautiful baby brother again. He had tried (and often enough failed) to protect him all his life and he could only do it from afar now, too, as nobody would get to know about their new relationship, but he would do everything in his power to assure his beloved wouldn’t be seriously harmed again.

And he hoped his heavenly friend would keep an eye on him as well. And he might have heard Joseph say, _“Of course I will, Mycroft Holmes.”_

And when he was all over his dear boy and proceeded to take him apart, he was smiling.

It was the night of nights and they made the very best of it – their first night of being brothers and lovers.

😇 The End 😇


End file.
